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Duran-Torres’ 3 tips for success

• Think creatively, be innovative and take risks. • Listen to people; it will get you further than talking. • Creative problem solving is 80 percent of success.

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When it comes to creative control, Tracy Duran-Torres tends to put the emphasis on the ‘control’ part.

She didn’t make it out of her first year of graphic design school because “I didn’t like being told what to do in terms of art.” That led her to the University of Nevada-Las Vegas in her hometown and, in her view, the less constricting artistic pursuit of a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in painting. Next came a master’s in painting and drawing from Cal State Fullerton.

But when Duran-Torres’ first job landed her at the Des Moines Art Center in 2007 as a visiting artist, she increasingly began to gravitate to a world dominated less by control than by chaos: The young-yet-broken lives assisted by local agencies such as Youth Emergency Services and Shelter (YESS), Children and Families of Iowa and Oakridge Neighborhood Services.

Kids living in group homes. Kids in trouble with the law. Kids whose brains are wired to the complicated tune of the autism spectrum. So many of the normal rules don’t work for them, as they once didn’t for somebody with far less to worry about — like Duran-Torres during that aborted graphic design pursuit.

If she could find her voice, her control, through the freedom that art can provide when left unfettered, then she wanted to help others travel that road as well. Chaos be damned.

“This is about walking into a room and completely relinquishing judgment,” said Duran-Torres, 33. “If you can’t get past the fact that they are a criminal or a sex offender, you shouldn’t be there. Focus on the fact they are making the effort. The arts can give them something that academics can’t, and that life is not.”

Seeing is believing

Duran-Torres’ passion and leadership on that front led her to accept the position of outreach and adult programs coordinator last year at the Art Center, which now has 10 programs meant to help people find solid ground through things like painting, weaving and sculpting.

“Tracy is truly changing lives,” said Christine Doolittle, director of marketing and communications at the Art Center. “Kids who flat out refuse to speak are communicating through their artwork. She really has the ability to gain their trust.”

Her first major lesson in trust happened without the aid of art, though. Duran-Torres was in high school and became a tutor for some of the disadvantaged youths who regularly populated a Las Vegas boxing gym. That’s where she met Melinda Cooper.

Now 28 years old, Cooper is a leasing agent for a property management company while still doing some boxing on the side. Fifteen years ago, it was a different story.

“Tracy was a strong influence on me,” Cooper said. “I was a bit of a troublemaker. I don’t know where I would have been without her, but I wouldn’t have had my head on like I do now. She became like a sister/mother figure to me. I always looked to her for advice. She’s very warm and comforting and she’s never let me down.”

A more recent inspirational tale involved a young boy struggling with an autism spectrum disorder and the six months he spent doing art projects with Duran-Torres. This is way beyond hanging your kid’s artwork on the refrigerator kind of stuff.

“It took this boy two weeks just to look me in the eye,” Duran-Torres said. “Eventually he was showing his work at our art shows and going up to the Art Center director to ask him if he wanted to see what he did.”

Margaret Toomey, a teacher with the Des Moines public school system who works exclusively with at-risk populations, said she became convinced of Duran-Torres’ ability to relate to troubled kids after just six weeks of work with her during an in-school program.

After that, Toomey was begging to bring the kids to the Art Center on a regular basis to continue the relationship.

“Chaos does not reign in the environment that she establishes,” Toomey said. “There is a sense of structure and order that is essential, but at the same time she works with each kid differently depending on their needs. She enjoys that diversity and gives all of them an opportunity to express who they truly are. They are empowered by it.”

Trying to brighten things up a bit

Duran-Torres remembers when she started falling in love with art. Her high school photography class only dealt in black and white images, but her taste for color was insatiable, so she experimented with adding layers of paint to the photos themselves.

That’s a bit like what she’s doing with the kids. Sometimes, there is just too much gray on the palette in both art and in life.

“Art gives them the freedom of communication,” Duran-Torres said. “It can do that for anybody, but the kids embrace it a bit differently once they realize what it is doing for them. It is giving a sense of accomplishment and pride to people faced with obstacles that seem nearly impossible to overcome.”

Someplace that has never felt short on color since Duran-Torres arrived here is Des Moines itself.

A professor of hers at Cal State Fullerton had previously worked at the Art Center as a visiting artist and gave the experience high marks. That was good enough for Duran-Torres, but she still only expected to fulfill a two-year contract and then move on to try something else.

Several contract extensions, a promotion and six years later, Duran-Torres looks forward to a long-term future here with her husband and 2-year-old child.

“Iowa nice” is a real thing, she discovered, after living here several months and remarking how surprised she was when somebody finally treated her rudely.

One might say we’ve got things under control. Just the way Duran-Torres likes it.